Even BJP leaders are said to be disillusioned with Patel's inability to bring about a change at the top: chief secretary L N S Mukandan, principal secretary to the chief minister P K Lahiri and home secretary P G Ramrakhiyani, seen as remnants of Shankersinh Vaghela-Dilip Parikh era, have enjoyed an unbroken stint. While it is no comment on their own abilities, it does send out a wrong signal, that the top-level administrative machinery which had allegedly helped the RJP government ``make controversial decisions'' is still in place.

Interestingly, the Mukandan-Lahiri team had been at the helm at the time of the floods in Mehsana district last year. If they had learnt anything from their mistake it did not show during the cyclone rescue operations. While it is easy to apportion blame in hindsight, a 24-hour warning was good enough to send at least a cavalcade of trucks from various parts of the state to places which were going to be affected. At the last moment the lack of vehicles was seen to be the major impediment in the vacating of coastal areas.

This perceived `lack of planning' was deliberate, senior officers say. The bureaucracy itself is divided over the manner in which the chief minister is being advised. Some maintain that chief minister is not even able to meet others and see a different side to any story. The tendency to run everything from the CMO is also resented by this group.

The controversial captive power policy was allegedly conceived by the same group of bureaucrats. R B Gupta, currently collector, Mehsana, was then deputy power secretary. He had protested against the policy, which, sources say, was a deliberate effort to favour certain business houses. ``Everyone knows how Vaghela was able to push it through. Even after the note on the file that, if implemented, the project would `ruin the finances of the state for all times to come''', says an officer.

Interestingly, not only has nothing been found amiss in the policy but Patel has chosen to continue with it.

Or take R Shukla, collector of Gandhinagar during Vaghela's tenure. He approved land deals worth Rs 16 crore has been implicated in the alleged transfer of land to the Samarpan Seva Trust, which is linked to Vaghela. Shukla was due to retire on April 30 this year, but on May 1 he was given a special posting in the chief minister's office. He is now OSD (protocol) in CMO.

``The chief minister's style of working is such that he likes to take everyone along with him and is trying to use the same officers as an antidote to the work done by the previous regime,'' says a middle-rung officer.

Party spokesman Bharat Pandya echoes the same sentiments: ``Keshubhai does not want acrimony within the senior ranks and may be these same officers will lead us to the wrongdoings of Vaghela and Parikh.'' Daydreaming, say others. The fact is that the Suresh Mehta committee, which was supposed to investigate and issue a white paper on corruption during the Vaghela regime, has been unable to come up with a shred of evidence against him.

Vaghela himself is cocky: ``This government should resign over its handling of the cyclone situation. Also, it has not been able to find anything against me in 100 days. It should stop making baseless allegations.''